Reflecting 2010

I had started preparing this post a few weeks ago but after a bout of the flu saw through our household and the birth of my first nephew " Teagan Sage" we have started 2011 with a bang!! Therefore, I have been delayed in posting this and I have made a commitment to myself not to rush to post something that I hadn't polished first so here it is.

Happy New Year!! The start of a new year is always a great time for self reflection of the past year realizing how much has changed or what you wish would change.  For us this past year had been one of the most amazing years we have ever had as we watched our daughter grow from a new born to and infant and now nearly a toddler.  

In the first year of life there are more changes then at any other time in your life truly an amazing experience, and one of continual transition.  As we start this new year we are hit with yet again much transition, Julia has been exclusively breastfed and when I say that I mean exclusively she has never had a bottle.  At 6 months we started her with water in a sippy cup she took to this instantly and loves water out her sippy cup so we intend on doing the same with her milk.  This is the first thing that we are going to tackle as this new year begins along with that comes many decisions as to what we are replacing her breastmilk with as homo milk is what is recommended at age one however, with a vegan diet that is not something that we wish to give her, at present we have started a soy based formula in her cereal to allow her to become familiar with the taste.  So stage one of the transition is from breastmilk to soy based formula.

The problem with switching to solely soy milk as it does not have the fat and calories that homo milk does and that babies need to grow, you can use a variety of milk: almond milk, rice milk, hemp milk, coconut milk and so on but the issue remains not enough fat... so this is something we intend to learn more about in next few months to see how we can ensure our daughter is getting all the nutrients that she needs.

Over the holidays we had many discussions with family and great friends about diet and lifestyle and we are really struggling with the right choices for our daughter. I will end with baby's need healthy fats to grow and for their brain to develop homo milk is the perfect recipe but it is for baby cows?! So why is there alternative for babies? So for now we ween the breastmilk add in soy based formula.

Any thoughts on how to supplement homogenized cow's milk for a baby? 

We are busy putting the final touches on Julia's 1st Birthday Party (tomorrow) pictures and recipes to come soon.